Child literacy matters – volunteering with Chapter One and Cisco

According to data from the Department for Education, two-thirds of primary school children who do not reach the expected reading standard at the age of 7 do not reach the expected reading standard at the age of 11 either.

Closing the digital gap

During the academic year 2023/24 and again in 2024/25, Converge has been partnering with Cisco and supporting an organisation called Chapter One whose mission is “to create a world where all children have the literacy skills to thrive”. They work to transform children's futures with one-to-one reading support at the time when they need it the most. This includes forging connections with schools and corporate volunteers like Converge.

One of Converge’s missions is to help close what’s called the digital gap. Access to technology is uneven across society, not only for socio-economic reasons but also for generational ones. One way we contribute at Converge is by providing colleagues with up to 3 days of paid volunteering time annually to practically help to close this gap.

Every school week, a group of Converge volunteers each spend 30 minutes with their paired students in a one-to-one virtual setting, to help them build their reading confidence and to develop their reading skills.

“I have been impressed with their reading and I feel that the student is taking a lot from the sessions”, says Keeleigh Wright, Product Manager at Converge. “It is a commitment, but keeping to consistent weekly sessions has established a good routine for us.”

The children are in either Year 1, 2, or 3 and between the ages of 5 and 8 who struggle with their oral language development and word vocabulary. This can be for a variety of reasons, for instance lack of access to books at home or English not being their first language.

Andrea Reardon, Service Delivery Manager at Converge, says: “We are seeing fantastic engagement and progress from the young person involved. He is only 6 years old and therefore very early in his reading journey, but once we established a routine in our sessions, he settled extremely well and puts in so much effort”.

Our volunteers help to complement the work done in the classroom so that the children go from learning-to-read to reading-to-learn. A typical reading session will include using phonics and reading strategies to help decode the English language.

Andrea continues: “We start the session by running through some flashcards, then move onto reading some short stories of his choosing and then we finish with some games. I’ve discovered a real competitive nature in them while playing the word-guessing game.”

Confidence is key

As students build upon their foundational reading skills and start to develop a love for stories and books they become more confident readers, which helps to broaden their horizons contributing to their future success.

Jane Byrne, in Risk and Compliance at Converge, is appreciative of the support provided by Chapter One via regular meet and greet events and says: “It was good to speak to other volunteers and to meet the child I have been linked with. I had my first one-to-one reading session yesterday and it went very smoothly, I felt that both my student and I got so much from the half hour session - I am looking forward to next week's session already.”

Jane discovered that 38% of 11-year-olds from disadvantaged communities in England leave primary school unable to read to the expected standard, so this is the kind of volunteering that can make a huge difference to the life prospects of children and was something that Jane was able to fit into her working week.

Our volunteers become reading role models for their students, and over the course of the school year help to encourage their student’s reading progress by gently guiding them to learn successful reading habits.

On asked whether he would recommend Chapter One, our networking specialist Ed Bullock who has completed over 20 sessions, says: “It continues to be a positive and rewarding experience, particularly when I think about where we were in the beginning compared to now. I enjoy helping them move forward with their reading and look forward to seeing where we will be in summer”.

Converge is proud to support Chapter One to help drive childhood literacy, through our partnership with Cisco. In this our second year of volunteering with them, we have more readers giving their time to more children in schools across the United Kingdom.

As our Global Director of Sustainability, Sheryl Moore says: “Without literacy, it’s hard to live the life you want. From our earliest years, literacy skills help you develop and communicate. But life challenges can impact and it’s easy to fall behind. This is where organisations like us can help.”